Local Flavor
My story last week in AM New York seems to have been picked up around town here in Brooklyn. Apparently I’m not the only person in a love-hate abusive relationship with the F train.
While we’re on the topic, you know what I hate about the F train? That Fort Hamilton Parkway is a goddamn local stop, and the train goes express whenever it is running late (which is several times a day), so at least 2-3 times a week back when I was commuting daily, it would spontaneously skip my stop and I’d have to get off at Church Avenue and either walk ten minutes more to get home, or have to wait for the next train back. That skip probably added an hour to my commute each week, which adds up to TWO FULL DAYS OF MY LIFE each year.
No wonder I started writing to fill the time.
Anyway, where was I? Oh, yes. Two local blogs have picked up my story, which is pretty cool. Both include big cover images of The Warded Man, which is even cooler.
The first is the Brooklyn Streets, Carroll Gardens blog, which picked the story up on Wednesday. The writer clearly feels my F-Train pain. We are all brothers and sisters in our suffering.
The next is even more local, from right here in Kensington (that’s Kensington Brooklyn, not London or any of over a dozen others). The post is on the Kensington, Brooklyn blog, and is clearly written by someone who writes professionally, because they pulled out the somewhat archaic “one page equals 250 words” formula, which only writers know. It’s a formula not known for it’s accuracy, but it’s damn convenient for quick math.
Despite this, the writer is pretty much spot on. He assumes that 400 pages at 250 words each means I wrote about 100,000 words on my phone on the subway. Actually, I only wrote about 60% of the book’s prose on the subway, but since The Warded Man started out at 168,000 words, 60% works out to be, lo and behold, 100,800 words.
Written on my phone.
With my thumbs.
Ugh. Arthritis, here I come!
Other things that suck about the Ft. Hamilton stop: It only has that steel barred go ’round, which you CANT GET A SUITCASE THROUGH. I always have to beg someone to open the fire exit so I can get my luggage through. Then I feel like a thief, even though I paid.